That’s what three environmental groups, including the World Wildlife Fund, want to know. They wonder what sins the trees have committed to deserve this premature conclusion, other than to “offer with their fronds shelter and intimacy to sex slaves” at work along the Tronto River?

But with nearly 600 prostitutes working their way through this forest in central Italy, local authorities think chopping wood is the only way to root out all the other wood going up there. It’s not the first attempt to bring down prostitution in the area, but deforestation may prove to be their hardest try.